Meet Ebirah!

[QTOFFER]

I picked this feisty little guy yesterday. He's not at all shy and will take frozen food from my fingers! I do watch out for those huge claws!

Right now, he's in a 2.5 gal. My plan is to set up my 29 gal, move the angels into it from the 15, move the blue cray from the 10 into the 15 and get him a friend or two, and move Ebirah into the 10. Right now, Ebirah is about 4 inches - he can grow to be 7.

 

[QTOFFER]

Ebirah Pics

Here one of Ebirah emerged from his hiding burrow, and one of him eating some frozen food that he grabbed from my fingers.

 

[Meredith]

OOOH! Neat! How do / will you have his tank decorated? Are they pretty easy to care for? There is NO way I would be putting my fingers near that guys pincers.
Congrats QT!

 

[lmw80]

wow! very nice!!

 

[Fluff]

Very cool. Congrats!!

 

[Hara]

just plain nifty!

 

[GIMojo]

WOW!!!

whats the name of it, how much it cost?? lol

 

[QTOFFER]

OOOH! Neat! How do / will you have his tank decorated? Are they pretty easy to care for? There is NO way I would be putting my fingers near that guys pincers.
Congrats QT!

I'm going to put a deep bed of small colored gravel in the 15 gal for him. My blue crayfish, Elwood, occupies himself for hours by moving the gravel to one side of the tank one piece at a time. I don't think sand would be as much fun, and pebbles might be too big for him to pick up.

I found out the hard way that these guys rip through plants - even otherwise indestructible Java moss - so no plants. I've got a nice piece of driftwood and lots of rocks. They love to tunnel beneath a flat piece of slate.

As far as care, crays are pretty easy. Like all inverts, they are extremely sensitive to metals. They don't need or do well in a heated tank. They need extremely well oxygenated water or else they can drown - an airstone is a necessity. I feed any kind of sinking pellet/wafer, frozen food, and fresh veggies.

I find that I have to gravel vac my cray tank more often than my other tanks. Crays are messy eaters - they mash up and spray their food around as they eat. Also, the types of food they eat tend to get trapped in the gravel, rather than in the filter. Crays like to hide/bury food too - I found a big mass of fungus covered food in Elwood's cave the first time I did a gravel vac in his tank - he wasn't too happy when I removed it.

 

[czcz]

Neat

 

[fearlessfisch]

Wow....he looks like he would be delicious with drawn butter!

Just kidding. He is a very handsome cray. Congratulations!

 

[Zagz]

He looks awfully sweet. Makes me want one. He looks like he has a ton of personalilty!

 

[greenmaji]

Have you thought about trying under gravel jets for crays? and how about a sump with plants in it to help with filtration..

 

[TankGirl]

He is truly gorgeous, Andy! His color is just wonderful - congratulations!

 

[severum mama]

That is so cool!

They don't need or do well in a heated tank.

Are they sensitive to changes in temps? Like is it ok to keep them without a heater to keep the temp constant? I've looked at crays before and I'd love to get one someday. Nice find, he's beautiful! BTW how do you know he is a "he"?

 

[krazymom]

Nice, did you find him somewhere wild? Once when I was a kid we found some and put them a container in our cooler to bring them home. When we got home they looked very dead and didn't move, we thought we killed them. Then after awhile of being out of the cooler they warmed up and they magically came back to life! Duh, I guess we shouldn't have put them in a COOLER! We didn't know how to take care of them though and they died later anyways

 

[Menagerie]

Has he molted for you?

 

[QTOFFER]

I actually don't know the sex of either of my crays. I'd have to pick them up, flip them over, and examine the first pair of swimmerettes beneath their tail. I don't want to put them through the stress. OK, I'll admit it, I'm scared of those huge claws!

Regardless of the true sex, any blue crays I own have to be named after the Blues Brothers, Jake and Elwood; and this red monster is named after the big red lobster monster from the old Godzilla films!

Elwood, my blue cray molted twice, but I lost Jake during a molt. Ebirah hasn't molted yet, and I'll be holding my breath when he does. So many things can go wrong during a molt.